The Impossible Dream of World Evangelism
Mark 16:15 “You are to go into all the world and preach the Gospel to everyone, everywhere.”
Can you imagine what a mind boggling statement this must have been to these eleven scared and unbelieving men. At the point of this statement, they didn’t even have the faith to go on and now they are told to go into all the world. These men were faced with a lot of limitations that made this statement even more impossible sounding. They were limited in where they could go, they were limited in what they could do, and they were limited in the resources to get the job done.
Let’s face it, what the Lord was telling them and you is impossible! Just like those disciples, you don’t have what it takes to get the job done. It requires talents and resources that you don’t possess.
In the natural this would normally disqualify you for the job, but in the Spiritual, your lack of resources and inability are the very thing that qualifies you. The Lord seldom calls you to any task that you can perform acceptably without His help. When limited men hook up with an unlimited God anything is possible. The “Beck” translation renders Luke 18:27 this way, “What man can’t do, God can do.” Another way of saying it is, when the “I can’t” man meets the “I can” God, then the impossible is accomplished. In fact, “I can” is berthed out of your “I can’t.”
It’s always the Lord’s intention, when He calls you to some impossible tasks, to accompany you. Matthew 28:19-20, says, “Go and I will go with you.” You going engages His power, provision, and presence. Jesus has all the power and authority to get the job done, all He needs is a vessel that He can work through; a heart that He can love through; a mouth that He can speak through; and a hand that He can touch through.
Limiting what you can attempt for God to only those things you know you can accomplish requires no faith. Hudson Taylor once said, “There are three phases in most great tasks undertaken for God: impossible, difficult, and done.”
Jesus wants you to dream the impossible dream of world evangelism. Proverbs 29:18 says, “Where there is no vision the people perish.” You could substitute the word dream for vision. What I mean by dream, is to see yourself, other people and your circumstances not as they are, but as they could be. To dream is to see things differently and to work towards what you see. Many of God’s people have perished simply because they have never dreamed some impossible dreams with God.
God has a dream where this world is concerned and because He is a big God, this is a big dream. 1 Timothy 2:4 articulates the dream, “God wants all men to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth.” What makes this dream so big is the word “all.” Can you imagine God wants everyone, everywhere to be saved!
It’s the bigness of God’s dreams for you as individuals that tends to overwhelm you and eventually cause you to regard them as impossible. The key to turning the impossible into the possible is to dream this dream with God, for it’s the combination of God wanting it and you wanting it that will bring it to pass. As I said earlier, God has all the power and authority to bring this dream of world evangelism to pass, all He needs is a dreaming, believing and yielded vessel to work through.
Jim Newsom
Insights
- Don’t be the kind of Christian that has enough religion to come to Church on Sunday, but not enough compassion to go out to the world on Monday.
- If you’re not teaching people how to be saved, perhaps you have forgotten the tragedy of being lost.
- If you’re not sharing the message of forgiveness, it may be because you don’t remember what it was like to be guilty.
- All of us should have been sent to hell, but because of the grace of God through Jesus Christ, we weren’t. But let us never forget though we weren’t sent to hell, we were sent somewhere. We were sent to the lost.
- All the New Testament can be summed up in two words. The first is an invitation and the word is “Come.” The second is a command and the word is “Go.” To get in on the invitation and not take responsibility for the command is to frustrate the very reason we were given the invitation in the first place.
- Remember, Jesus saves us to send us; He helps us to make us a helper, and He blesses us to make us a blessing.
Diane’s Updates
Ronan is gearing up for the ice-skating competition next month. He is also going to be attempting the level one skating competence test. He is working with two coaches now and that has really helped him. He continues to be part of the synroc ice-skating team. They have a competition in Michigan in December.
Riker continues to be a joy at daycare. The workers tell us that he is so compassionate to the other children. He goes and cuddles with someone when they are crying and helps them up if they fall.
Jessica has been killing it at work lately. She was able to help her team land a deal that was over triple the largest she had ever gotten. Hopefully that will mean a big bonus for her.
We are going to tackle going through the rest of the bins and boxes in the garage this month. Jessica and Nick will take a few days off work so we can get it cleared out to park our cars in it. If I don’t see another box for a very long time, I will be so glad!
Be Blessed as you continue to serve the Lord!